Sentential Links #92

Ninety-two! Get 'em while they're hot!

:: I am so very, very tired of finger-waving scolds, moralists, and prudes having a conniption fit over things that wouldn't raise an eyebrow in other parts of the country. I'm tired of the embarassment of the rest of the country thinking that everyone in Utah is like these folks that make so much trouble and end up in the "news of the weird" columns. More importantly, I'm tired of the prudes having such an outsized amount of influence over the culture in these parts. (While on vacation in Utah with my mother years ago, my father tried ordering a second beer in a restaurant. Hilarity ensued.)

:: This is one of the characteristics I viscerally loathe in certain members the human species -- sanctimonious, busy-body, judgmentalism coming from people who have neither the insight, the perspective or the sensitivity to render any kind of opinion about other people's personal lives and marriages. And yet they do it, with great confidence in their own ability to see inside other people's most personal relationships.

:: Just what is the deal with home decor stores these days? All the goods for for sale are either bundles of brown sticks, lumps of unpainted clay, or a sheet of rusty and dented metal. It's like browsing for housewares in the Khyber Pass: (Thanks, Lynn!)

:: It’s like a monk who decides to try alcohol for the first time, so he strides into the liquor store and gets a bottle of wine, some whiskey, a vodka, something printed in spanish which may or may not be be tequila, the makings for Jello-shots, and a case of beer. I mean, why screw around, right? (Geez, I only bought four games, spread over two trips to Target. And I only bought the cheap-o games, the ones that are $9.99 each. I haven't bought the Star Wars Best of PC set yet, because it's forty bucks, but even that works out to eight bucks per game.)

:: Ellen is offered a Zoo Pal plate as a consolation prize as well as the option of a Dinosaur Fork, a Piggy Spoon or (I am saying this out loud and LOUDLY as I pull the brown piece of plastic out of the box, by the 3rd syllable, I notice my fatal error but it's too late to stop...) or this... (I'm not revealing the punchline. Go to Jen's place to find out, and roundly laugh at her expense!

But really, you see products like this and you wonder if the people who came up with them were never in 7th grade? Can't you just hear the Beavis-and-Butthead laughing in the background here?)

:: Al Gore's recent congressional testimony on the subject, and the chilly reception he received from GOP members, suggest the discouraging conclusion that skepticism on global warming is hardening into party dogma. Like the notion that tax cuts are always good or that President Bush is a brave war leader, it's something you almost have to believe if you're an elected Republican. (Not a blog post, actually, but an interesting op-ed.)

:: I'm an officially published writer! (I hate her so much....)

:: The prom queens who wouldn’t piss on your head if your hair were on fire pleading to vote for them because it’s their dream and they’ve worked sooo hard for this.

:: It's going to give every pirate fan an arrrrgasm, I think. (Boo, hiss! But what an awesome trailer. I hope the movie's as good.)

And that's all for this week. Carry on, folks.